After decades of losing in FIBA Americas and CentroBasket tournaments, the Dominican Republic can finally send a very competitive team to this year’s FIBA Americas tournament. Nonetheless, they will have to overcome a few hurdles in order to qualify for the 2010 FIBA Worldcup. Thus, in arguably one of the best round-robin games the Dominican Republic will face Argentina on the 30^th of August at 10:30 p.m. GMT.

While Argentina is known for its basketball enthusiasm and NBA players, there was no indication that the Dominican Republic could possibly become a force in the foreseeable future. However, several NBA players who grew up in the United States are descendants of Dominican immigrants and have expressed their interest in representing the country of their families and ancestors. More specifically, Detroit Pistons forward Charlie Villanueva, New York Knicks center Al Horford and Los Angeles Lakers shooting guard Trevor Ariza announced that they are looking forward to playing for the Dominican Republic in the FIBA Americas 2009 tournament in Puerto Rico. Moreover, the team will feature Francisco Garcia from the Sacramento Kings who already played for the Dominicans in the past.

Argentina on the other hand has been able to field a decent squad for a long time now and is hoping to qualify once again for the FIBA World Cup next year. However, the Argentines are missing All-Star Manu Ginobili from the San Antonio Spurs who will not play this summer to be at full strength for the 2009-10 NBA season. Nonetheless, the Argentine national team will feature Luis Scola from the Houston Rockets, Andres Nocioni from the Sacramento Kings and possibly Carlos Delfino. Delfino who just signed a new contract with the Milwaukee Bucks is projected to be a game-time decision as he is still recovering from a shoulder injury.

Given the fact that the Dominican Republic has not participated in any tournament with their new squad it is difficult to predict how well the team will function together. Therefore, Argentina can still be considered to be the favorite for this match-up but the Dominicans are expected to stay within striking distance throughout the game.

You can watch all games of the Dominican Republic and Argentina right here on www.watchlivenba.com, the home of live FIBA International streaming.